The Candy Caper
by poppets
Summary: Fjord discovers the dangers of travelling with a sugar-obsessed blue tiefling. This came from a tumblr prompt from princessamericachavez: "Please, don't make me go back." Thanks for sending me down this rabbit hole. Quite possibly not the story you were expecting from that prompt :)


"Fjord?"

… . .

"Fjord?" Molly waved a hand in the half-orc's face. "Anyone home?"

"Huh? Wha..?" Fjord shook his head, jostling his brain back into working order. "Sorry, Molly. What were you saying?"

"Are you ok, mate? You look positively green. Well, greener than normal, anyway."

Fjord scrubbed a shaky hand across his face. "I've seen some weird shit in my life, but nothing like I experienced today."

Beau plopped down on the bench beside Molly. "What the fuck happened? I thought you were taking Jester to that candy shop?"

A shudder chased down Fjord's spine. "Please don't mention candy."

Molly leaned forward, propped his elbows on the table and rested his chin in his hands. "Now this should be interesting. Spill."

Fjord's eyes held a haunted look. "It all began when…"

* * *

"Come on, Fjord. Hurry up!" Jester had hold of his hand and was tugging urgently in the direction of the candy shop.

Fjord chuckled. "Slow down, darlin'. The candy won't have all been sold."

"Wait! They might have sold all the candy? Oh no," and she took off running for the door.

Fjord sighed as he picked up his pace, trotting after her. He shouldered through the door, colliding with Jester who'd stumbled to a halt just inside the entry.

"Shit! Don't stop so suddenly. I nearly bowled you over."

Jester didn't react to his words. She seemed to be in a trance. He dropped a hand onto her shoulder and was surprised to discover her whole body was vibrating. She felt like a spring that had been wound too tight.

"Why, hello there," the shopkeeper called out. "Is there anything I can help y-"

Jester let out what Fjord could only describe as a battle cry and dove head first into a barrel of gummy candies.

Fjord was stunned. Completely frozen, unable to react. His brain was yelling that he should be doing something about the current situation, but surprisingly he'd never anticipated this particular scenario.

It was the shopkeeper's scream that finally jolted Fjord to action.

Jester was making happy little squeals – muffled as they were with her upper body buried in a barrel full of candy. Her feet were sticking straight up in the air and he grabbed one and tried to yank her out. She jerked and twisted to shake his hold and her tail swung up, smacking into his side and sending him flying.

He winced as he crashed into something fragile and surprisingly sticky. He lay there for several moments, stunned and idly wishing he'd activated the Armor of Agathys. He heard a whimper and glanced up to see a row of little, crying faces pressed to the shop window. He'd landed right on the giant chocolate owlbear in the window display, crushing it and sending its red – he licked one of his hands – raspberry filling splattering across the window. He tried not to think about the nightmares of disembowelled forest creatures that would most likely haunt these children. He scraped the raspberry from his face and hauled himself upright.

The barrel of gummy candy had now toppled, and its previous occupant was nowhere to be seen. Fjord followed the sound of humming to find Jester on all fours, digging through a container of marzipan animals.

"Jester?" Fjord kept his voice soft as he walked towards her, moving cautiously as one might approach a cornered, wild animal.

"Hmm?" Came the distracted reply.

He crouched down next to her but was careful to keep his distance. "What are you doing?"

"I'm collecting the pocket hamsters."

"You're collecting the pocket hamsters?"

"Yep!" She smiled happily and opened her hand to reveal a collection of tiny marzipan hamsters. "I'm going to make them teeny unicorn horns and take them on adventures."

How exactly was he supposed to respond to that? "That sounds like a good idea, Jester. Why don't we pay for them and go back to the Leaky Tap to show the others?"

Jester gaped at him. "We can't leave yet. We only just arrived and there is too much still to see."

Fjord opened his mouth to protest, only to be interrupted by the affronted voice of the shopkeeper.

"What is going on! Who are you? What are you doing to my shop?"

Fjord stood and turned what he hoped was an apologetic smile on the poor man. "My apologies, sir. My friend didn't mean any harm, she was just a little overwhelmed by the sheer wonder of your fine shop." Fjord could hear said friend making excited exclamations as she darted from display to display, discovering new wonders. "And of course, we will happily pay for any damages." There was a dull thump in the background. "Handsomely."

"Hmph. Yes, well, I suppose that would be fine." The man jumped when Jester appeared by his side, blowing bubbles with the too many sticks of gum she'd shoved in her mouth.

"Excuse me, sir. Do you have lollipops?"

He looked at Jester askance. "Lollipops? Ah, yes, over there," he waved his hand vaguely, "by the wall."

"Thank you," was the singsonged reply followed by another smack of gum.

The shopkeeper turned a glare on Fjord. "And please try to control your friend."

"Of course, of course…" Fjord trailed off as the other man's eyes widened.

"By all the gods," he whispered.

Fjord spun around, finding Jester with a giant rainbow lollipop in her hands. He watched in horror as she raised it above her head in triumph, before bringing it down violently on a display of sugar dragons.

"Begone, naughty dragons. No evil shall survive the might of Jester's Spiritual Weapon."

"Jester!"

"Look, Fjord, this shop has spiritual weapons." She glanced at the deadly lollipop clutched in her hands, "Well, technically, it's not a real spiritual weapon, technically, but it looks just like mine," she gave it a lick, "and it's tasty too."

Fjord winced as she brandished it about. She narrowly missed the shopkeeper with one wild swing. The shopkeeper promptly fainted, collapsing in an undignified heap. The presence of a giant sugary weapon inches from his face obviously too much to handle.

"Whoops," Jester giggled. She glanced over at Fjord. "He must have been evil. My spiritual weapon only works on bad people."

"Jester, why don't you hand me the lollipop."

She immediately clutched it to her chest and pushed out her bottom lip.

"Don't worry, I just want to hold it for a minute."

"Oh, ok." Her smile was instantaneous. "Here you go. Enjoy."

Fjord carefully returned the lollipop to the display then knelt to check on the shopkeeper. He let out a relieved breath when he felt a steady pulse. It was probably for the best that he was out cold, and not yelling for the guards.

"Hey, Fjord? How much gold do you think Caleb needs?"

"Well, he's always broke, so… Wait. What?"

Fjord shot upright to find Jester with her hands full of gold wrapped chocolate coins. "You know that's chocolate and not gold, right"

"Duh." She rolled her eyes. "I think 200 gold coins should be enough. At least until he finds another smutty bookshop." She giggled as she adopted a terrible Zemnian accent and began to count out the coins. "One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six…"

Fjord tuned her out as he surveyed the scene – overturned displays, an exploded owlbear, candy strewn across the floor and an unconscious shop keeper. He started compiling a mental checklist of their crimes as were sure to be reported by the town criers:

 _Destruction of property?_ Check.

"Fifty-five. Fifty-six. Fifty-seven…"

 _Theft of goods?_ Check.

"One hundred and ten. One hundred and eleven. One hundred and twelve…"

 _Mentally scarring children?_ Check.

"One hundred and seventy-two. One hundred and seventy-three. One hundred and seventy-four…"

 _Attacking innocent shop keepers?_ Check.

"One hundred and ninety-nine. Two hundred!"

 _They had to get the fuck out of here._

"Jester, I think we should really be getting back to the Leaky Tap."

"But there's so much candy I haven't tried yet."

"Don't you want to show the others what you've found?" He could feel the panic and desperation rising. His mind was probably playing tricks on him, but he would swear he could hear the faint jangle of bells as the Crown's Guard came running. "And if we leave now you'll have something new to discover next time."

"Oh, ok."

Fjord released the breath he hadn't realised he was holding and began to shepherd her towards the door.

"Wait! I can't forget my spiritual weapon." Jester grabbed it from the display and shoved it into the haversack.

"Ok. Let's go."

"Wait!"

"What? What?"

"I have to pay for my candy. It's wrong to steal from innocent shop owners."

"Yes, of course we should pay." _For all this damage,_ Fjord added in the privacy of his own head.

"Is the shopkeeper still unconscious?"

"Yes."

"Well, how much do you think it costs for 200 gold chocolate coins, a giant lollipop, 12 marzipan hamsters, 20 sticks of chewing gum, 24 gobstoppers, 31 sour jellies, 63 sherbet sticks, 41 alcoholic truffles – those are for Nott – and the gummy candies I ate while I was in the barrel?"

"Ahhhh," Fjord mentally added the sugar dragons she'd destroyed, and the chocolate owlbear he'd crushed. Wincing, he dug a hand into his coin pouch and dropped a fistful of gold onto the counter. He'd probably be horrified later when he figured out how much money he'd left. "Ok, let's go."

Jester skipped out the door. "I can't wait to show the others our treasure."

* * *

"The fuck?" Beau whispered.

Molly was lost to laughter, his shoulders quaking as tears streamed down his face.

"It's not funny," Fjord growled.

"Yeah," Molly wheezed. "It really is."

"We could have been arrested."

Molly waved the words away. "You would have talked your way out of it."

Fjord was slightly mollified by the assurance behind the words. "Still."

"Where is our girl now?"

Fjord tilted his head towards the stairs. "She's up showing Nott her treasure."

Beau clapped Fjord on the back. "I'm gonna grab you a drink. I think you need it."

"Thanks Beau." Fjord let out a sigh as he felt himself finally start to relax, the adrenalin draining away.

Now that he was back amongst friends and the safety of the tavern he could admit to seeing the funny side of the whole experience. He chuckled to himself. There was never a dull moment with Jester around.

Several beers later, and feeling much calmer, he glanced up with a smile as Jester skipped down the stairs and over to their table.

"Hi Molly. Hi Beau. Hi Fjord."

"Hello, Jester." Molly's grin split from ear to ear. "I hear you had a good day."

Jester let out a happy little sigh. "I had the best day ever."

Molly couldn't suppress his smile. "I wish I could have been there.

"Oh, that reminds me. I came down here for a reason."

Fjord raised a quizzical eyebrow.

"Can you take Nott and I to the candy shop tomorrow? She wants to get some treasure of her own… and I've eaten all my candy."

Fjord's brain had apparently deserted him as he gaped blankly, not able to process the request.

Molly chuckled. "Of course we can."

"Yay! I'll go tell Nott the good news."

Fjord, Beau and Molly sat in silence as Jester crossed the room and climbed the stairs.

When she had disappeared out of sight Fjord reached out, fisted his hands in Molly's shirt and practically dragged the tiefling across the table. "Please, don't make me go back," he whimpered.

End.


End file.
